Maryland independent. [volume] (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1874-current, 1887-03-11
COTTON SEED OIL.

SpIead ttapidly IN the SOulHs
Various Useful Products Extracted From
An Article Once Thrown Away
In every bale Of cotton there are 1000
pounds of seed and 500 pounds Of lint.
As about two 'cros Of land are required
to raise bale Of cotton, one acre will
produce about 500 pounds Of cotton seed
which brings the planter $40 per ton or
So 80 per acre. A ton Of seed yields 76
gallons of oil, which sells for about 30
cents per gallon. It also yields about 20
pounds of short staple lint, useful for
making cotton batting, etc Besides
there is the meal, formerly considered
valuable only to mix with other food for
cattle, but which is now returned to the
soil in the shape Of fertilizer.
The gossyplum is a fertilizer especial
ly adapted to the needs Of cotton, and
its principal ingredient is cotton-seed
meal, or the puIverized cake from which
cotton seed oil has been expressed. As
the gossypium factory is dependent upon
the oil mill for material, aud the latter
finds in the fertilizer works a ready
market for its largest product, the two
are often found closely connected aud
governed by mutual interests.
The cotton-s seed upon entering the
mill first passes through the '1inters"--
delicate machines which remove from
each separate seed every particle Of its
flcecy covering which has escaped the
crudcr process of the cotton gin. From
the Inter it goes into the huller, where
its hull or shell is split open and torn off.
The meat is then boiled in huge cal
Srons, during which operation it gives
out rich, unctous odor, suggestive Of
culinary operations on large scale, but
not at all unpleasant. The boiled seed
encascd in small coarse bags, then
goes to "press" Twenty bags filled
with the wel-cooked mass are thrust into
as many rcceptacles of an immensely
powerful steam-prcss. Power is applied
gradually, but with terribly relentless
energy, until the oil, flowing out in
steady streams, and finding its way to
the receiving tanks below, has been en-
tireLy expressed from the several bags,
and each contains merely hard, dry
cake. From these cakes the sacking
covering is stripped, to be used again,
and they are thrust into the jaws of a
rapidly revolving mill that instantly re-
utfcc f1'-r7'ilioei, s 3Ss,s .@s.a,.s.
fertilizer factory across the way.
The Atlanta cotton-seed oil mill pro
duces 10, 900 barrels of oil and 1000 tons
Of meal annually. 1t is possible to SO
refine this oil as to produce tasteless,
odoress and colorless liquid, and its
sphere Of usefulness is being daily ex-
tended. 1t is largely used in adultera-
tons, and it is stated upon good author
ity that one-fourth of all the lard used in
this country is cotton-seed oil.
In this Atlanta mill nothing is wasted !;
even the hulls Of the cotton seed are
utilized as fuel beneath the boilers of
its 80 horsepower engine. Not only
do these hulls furnish fuel for this mill,
but half Of them forced through 600 feet
of pneumatis pipe, reach the ad djacent
"gossypium' works, and there form the
only fuel used to heat its boilers Be
sides cotton-seed meal, the ingredients
of the ''gossypium phospho" are sui
phuric acid, which is manufactured on
the premises rom sulphur imported by
the shipload from Sicily, muriate OF
potash, which comes from German
mines, nitrate Of soda, from Peru, SUI
phate of ammonia, from Chicago, and
phosphates, which are dug on the S one
River near Charleston, South Carolina.
In 1876 the cotton seed oil mills were
only paying the planters about eight
cents per bushcl for seed, as there was
no market for tie meal, and depending
upon the oil alone for a profit, they
could afford no more. Now they pay
from sixteen to eighteen cents per
bushel for the seed. The fertilizer
produced from it can be bought for
$32 per ton, and ton is sufficient for
about ten acres. The result of its use is
to double the yielding capacity of the
soil, 50 that the entire cost OF the fertili-
zcr is now betrayed by the cotton seed,
which was formerly an almost waste
product, and the extra yield of lint may
be considered as just SO much clear
profit. = IIarper's Weekly.